The U.S. Coast Guard was escorting a commercial fishing vessel into an Oregon harbor under heavy seas when it capsized on Tuesday night, killing three fisherman, two of whom were from New Jersey.

A 52-foot Motor Life Boat Victory went out to to meet the 42-foot Mary B II near the entrance to Yaquina Bay, the Cost Guard said in a statement.

The fishing boat was under its own power in the stormy Pacific Ocean contending with waves of 14-to-16 feet when it capsized just after 10 p.m., officials said.

Skipper Stephen Biernacki and crew members James Lacey, of South Toms River, and Joshua Porter, of Toledo, Oregon, had spent the past three days crabbing when the Mary B II ran into trouble returning to port and called the Coast Guard for an escort. The men didn’t send out a Mayday call, the Coast Guard said.

U.S. Coast Guard rescuers searching by helicopter found Lacey, 48, in the Pacific Ocean around 11:30 p.m. and flew him to a hospital in Newport, Oregon, where he was pronounced dead.

The Newport Fire Department located Porter, 50, near Nye Beach around 12:30 a.m. He was also pronounced dead at the local hospital.

The body of Biernacki, 50, of Barnegat, was spotted in the hull of the vessel about 100 yards offshore near the north side of the Yaquina Bay’s north jetty. He couldn’t be pulled from the cabin until several hours later due to the rough weather.

The tragedy was nothing new for Newport, a working fishing port about 130 miles southwest of Portland on Oregon’s central coast. The small town hosts a granite memorial at Yaquina Bay etched with more than 100 names of local fishermen lost at sea over the past century and shared tragedies are woven into the fabric of the community.

"It happens frequently enough that we actually have funds that help families during this time. We fundraise all year long, and we try to help them as much as we can," said Taunette Dixon, president of the nonprofit Newport Fishermen's Wives, which supports families who have lost a breadwinner to the waves.

But those in the industry said the loss hit particularly hard this year, when crabbers were rushing to sea to try to catch up after the annual Oregon Dungeness crab season was delayed more than a month. The season usually begins Dec. 1, but this year it only began last week because the crabs were too small and didn't have enough meat to harvest.

Then, a series of bad storms in the first week of the season prevented many crabbers from recovering their pots on Jan. 4, the first day they could do so, said Tim Novotny, spokesman for Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission.

"When they did get out, some of them had to stay out a little longer because of the weather. The difficulty is once you're out at sea, they can handle a lot of conditions. But the trouble is trying to get back across those bars," Novotny said.

A bar is an area near the coast where a river — in this case the Yaquina River — meets the sea. The force of the river water colliding with the ocean can create hazardous currents and swells, particularly during a storm. The Yaquina Bay bar is considered one of the more dangerous ones along the Oregon coast. On Wednesday, reports showed waves 16 feet tall there.

It’s so treacherous that the dangers of crossing it with a fully loaded crab boat were the premise of a spin-off of the “The Deadliest Catch,” a reality TV show about commercial fishermen that aired on the Discovery channel.

“The fishermen and their families know all too well, unfortunately that that danger is real. They accept the challenge because they love what they do,” Novotny said. “It’s part of who they are and what they do.”